Kei Kurono
Kei Kurono (玄野 計, Kurono Kei) is the protagonist of Gantz. He is a 10th grader summoned by Gantz, along with Kato, after being hit by a subway train in an effort to help a hobo passed out on the tracks. This Kurono is of course, an exact copy of the one that died. Initially Gantz refers to Kurono as "Bitch" and "Loser," though he settles on "Kurono" as the series progresses. In the beginning, he is a rather selfish character who often ends up being the reluctant hero. At one point, Kurono actually enjoys the brutal missions, having a chance to prove his mettle and to use the power Gantz's technology grants him to decimate his foes, as well as to receive the admiration of his team members (such as Sei or Kishimoto). This ceases after the death of Kato, where he becomes frightened of the missions and hesitates to act as recklessly as he had in the past. Another deciding factor in Kurono's decision to prioritize brains over force is his growing attachment to Kojima Tae. He starts to believe that he must come back alive in order to be with her. Kurono is eventually regarded as a hero by the other players who look up to him (he takes up Kato's philosophy that everyone should come back alive, ironic considering that Kato had tried to model himself after Kurono's younger self). To increase the survival of the Gantz Team members, Kurono holds meetings at his apartment where the team discusses missions and practice using the suits. These meetings appear to help greatly during the Oni mission as nearly all of the members survive in spite of the outstanding number of enemies. At the end of the mission, Kurono requests the revival of Kato and Nishi Joichiro. In Chapter 221, Kei leaves the game at the behest of his teammates. Kurono's memories of the hunts are supposedly erased, however he begins to remember his old life through pictures in his apartment. In addition, he rekindles his relationship with his former girlfriend Tae, whom he had forgotten because of his memory wipe. A meeting with a tabloid journalist also stirs up more Gantz-related memories and questions. In Chapter 236, he recovers some of his lost memories of being the Gantz team leader after being attacked by a group of vampires in his apartment. He fights bravely and nearly kills all of them using a "sun gun", although in the end he is slain by the same vampire that slew his brother, Kurono Akira. Kurono was dead as of the end of Phase 1, however Kato Masaru had planned to revive him. After an extremely hard fought mission, in which a team of highly skilled Gantz players from Osaka were all but defeated, Kato held good on his promise and revived Kurono at the end of Chapter 279. Another Kei has been revived in his Gantz suit and with memory up to the oni mission. Personality and Fighting Style Throughout the entire first two arcs Kei is seen as selfish, hesitant, and reckless, however his entire view on life and the Gantz games change after watching Kato's determination to keep everyone alive. After Kato and Kishimoto die during the Buddha aliens, he finds it in himself to overcome most of his fears and takes it upon himself to make Kato's mission a reality(To keep all of the players alive through the missions). As the missions go on, he is regarded as a "hero" and "leader" by the new members in the Gantz Tokyo team. Kei has been known to fight recklessly against the aliens, going up against the Rowdy and Grumpy Buddha aliens by himself, and against the Kappe Alien's Brachiosaurus. Originally he fought so hard, just to survive, and this the time he felt truly alive. Later he thinks of Tae during battle, determined to make it home again to see her. Izumi mentioned once that no one should be able to do what Kei does, and doesn't understand how Kei is so strong. Kei's strength and biggest change in personality after Arc 1 from was mostly a result of him being together with Tae. Sometimes he is seen leading people, or going with someone, other times he goes off on his own. Kei had been shown to skillfully make use of all of the Gantz equipment. Unlike the rest, he had sense to take an x-gun home and test it out, and figured out that the x-shotgun can lock onto multiple targets and fire at them all at once. Current Events After being revived by his friend Kato and received the news from Nishi that the world will end in 1 week, Kei has spent more time with his girlfriend Tae and is seen at the Tokyo Gantz team meeting with Nishi talking about the "End of the World" in 1 week's time. As Kurono enjoys and wastes his last days together with Tae, Reika visited his apartment and confessed her love to him, asking to sleep with him, but he rejects her saying he can't understand as to why she would have any feelings for him and tells her they are "worlds apart", meaning he is just a High school student and she is a celebrity. Kurono and the others have been recently transferred to the Gantz room, there he wonders if "this is our final mission" and gives a speech to everyone on how their bold determination and skills have gotten them this far. He and the others have been transported to an unknown country for their supposedly final battle where other Gantz players have also been transferred to. Kurono and the team are sent to Italy where the final battle with the Roman aliens is taking place, he and the rest of his team witnesses the amazing power of the Roman statue aliens as they break his and Kato's Gantz sword with ease. Along the way Kurono picks up an H-Gun and fights together with Kato, both of them witnessing Inaba being crushed to death. They fight the giant statue that killed Inaba with Kato being transported out by Gantz. Before being teleported himself the left side of Kurono's body (including half his face and his left arm) are blown off by the statue while Kurono does significant damage to the alien. At the end of the last mission, Kurono yelled at Gantz for not resurrecting Suzuki after being requested to by Reika. He later calmed down and left the room with the others. When Reika came back in, she ended up resurrecting a 2nd Kurono instead of Suzuki, although unwillingly. The copy appears with his suit on and an H-Gun in hand. Kurono later runs into 2nd Kurono who tries to get Kurono to switch places with him. Kurono refuses and says he belongs to Tae and the second Kurono should stay with Reika to make her happy. After waking up one day and noticing people standing around looking at the sky, Kurono sees that it has turned red. Quickly putting on his suit and stuffing his H-gun in a bag he meets up with Tae and while on the train he swears to himself that he will only protect Tae. At school that same day, Kei gets into a fight with some students and is sent to the office after school and while in the office he watches a TV that shows the destruction of America. After a while, he sees the arrival of giant machines with the same technology as Gantz arrive in Tokyo, that soon starts to destroy everything in their way. He then goes with Tae to the roof of the school, to see how some of these kind of machines are going directly to them. Kurono decides to fight until then end, so he and Tae could survive. Two machines arrives at the front of the school, where they intend to kill everyone that was outside, yet Kurono uses the H-Gun with his suit to attack both of them. Then he discovers that the machines were actually suits, with a creature similar to Gantz inside. One of this aliens tries to kill the director of the school, but Kurono saves him by killing the alien with the H-Gun. Later, the second alien tries to kill Kurono, killing one of his classmates instead, while he escapes with Tae on his arms. Kurono tries to run from the alien, but the creature matches his speed. Then, he throws Tae away so he can fight the alien alone, succesfully punching it in the leg. As the wounded alien starts to get away, Kei is about to shoot him with the H-Gun but then unexpectedly lets it go. The Principal questions Kurono about what he just did and what is happening but Kurono just ignores him and walks away with Tae. The second Kurono along with Reika battle numerous aliens. Together they save many people from the invaders. Reika tries to rescue people while the second Kurono fights off the aliens. While fighting the aliens, dodging their razor discs, he crashes into the ground on his back. The aliens prepare to fire at him when they all suddenly flatten into the ground. Reika comes to help the surprised second Kurono when suddenly unknown Gantzers appear around them. The original Kurono, Tae and their classmates go to rest at a hotel for the night. Kurono and Tae are laying in bed discussing the current events for them and what is going to happen. They are both about to fall asleep when the mecha start attacking again. Kei and Tae rush towards the door when Kei is getting transferred, much to the confusion of the both of them. Kei is sent to a different area where there are Gantz hunters everywhere. Kei groups with Kato, Kaze, Takeshi and Sakurai. After a brief argument with the men out the front, both Kei's are sent to another location. Both Kurono's fight the targets once the aliens start attacking. When one of the leaders attempt to engage numerous aliens in the hopes of capturing one, one of them looks directly at Kurono 1 and approaches him with the hope of engaging him. Kato yells at Kurono to run but Kurono 1 and 2 engage the blond alien but both fail to hit it. Both seem to have survived the transfer, although Kurono 1 is only seen. Both Kurono's get released in random areas. Kurono 1 protested about getting transported to a random area, but gets sent there anyway. Kurono 1 looks around desperately for Tae and finds her at the last minute. Tae gets put into a large cage and Kurono 1 swears to rescue her. Kurono 2 and Reika get sent to a random area as well. Kurono 1 goes into a cage and gets transported to where, he hopes that Tae will be. He gets sprayed down with the dissolving liquid, which has no effect on his suit or H-gun. He notices the bodies of people that have been hung upside down, and thinks that Tae might be among them. Kurono realizes that he may have arrived too late and starts to cry over the idea of losing Tae. He finds she is still alive, and follows her path, others going along with him. Once at the surface, he ends up helping others by using the Gantz sword to slice apart giant aliens that are stomping on them for sport. They are soon under attack by the aliens and Kurono decides on fleeing. As they run, a survivor mentions a girl calling out for him, Tae, but is killed before he can tell him where he saw her at. Kurono then leads them in a building which turns out to be a zoo with creatures from all the worlds the aliens had invaded. They soon discover that humans are on display there, two of them happen to be Natsu and Ryou. Ryou begs Kurono to free them, but Kurono has second thoughts about it. As the other survivors question Kurono why he is not saving them, being because he hated the guy, he lashes out on them saying that they can save themselves if they're going to keep bugging them. He changes his mind after thinking about it, taking out an X-gun and blasting the glass wall. After he breaks the glass wall he is seen fighting one of the aliens with the Gantz sword and cutting half of his face and probably defeats him. In chapter 327 he is seen jumping down a building and taking on an alien as hostage he then talks to her and says he wants her to take them outside. Kuruno 2 is seen with Reika and the others climbing the Gantz building up and trying to talk with the Gantz ball. Kurono 2 asks Gantz to remove the bombs from their heads so they are free of the other Gantzers control. Kurono 1 is trying to still get the alien outside in order to steal one of the suits that the aliens wear, but she insists that only soldiers are allowed out. Kurono 2 has the bomb removed from his head. After Nishi explains who the people are, he is confused as to how simple it is to take control of the world by defeating the 'giants'. When they find out that the ball can be used to communicate with other teams, he posts a message to the other players about the situation in Tokyo. He initially doesn't get a response, so he gets Reika to help out in delivering the message. He is annoyed that they get a response when Reika is the one delivering the message. In the latest chapter (331) Kurono 2 meets more of the new Gantzers that answer his call across Japan. He is especially taken aback and slightly nervous when a beautiful buxom blonde woman named Mary McClane is transported to the Gantz room. Meanwhile Kurono 1 has been betrayed by his alien hostage and is surrounded by numerous aliens in the Gantz suits. He tells her at swordpoint to tell them she's his hostage but she refuses. When one of the aliens attempts to grab Kei from behind he spins around and slices off its arm with his sword. A fierce battle between the suited aliens and Kurono ensues while the alien woman looks on helplessly. The final scene of the chapter shows Kurono standing before her, his adversaries piled in a bloody heap behind him. With x gun in hand Kurono then demands the alien woman to put on one of the dead soldiers' suits. The Kurono in the room questions Kaiji Yoshikawa about his earlier statement. He tells Kurono that Gantz can no longer heal any injuries. Category:Male Characters Category:Living Characters Category:Revived Characters Category:Characters who ever appeared on the Tokyo Gantz team Category:Playable characters in Gantz video game Category:Katastrophe Team